2023 has been a year of recovery for all cryptocurrencies, but some have experienced greater progress than others. Bitcoin rebounded 130% after a price appreciation journey largely fueled by the anticipation regarding the potential approval of the first-ever spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund. This led the crypto king to distance itself further from the rest of the market. Solana, the main Ethereum competitor, had an impressive run in 2024, surging almost 400%.
As for Ethereum, it ended the year with an unremarkable 66% increase. The ETH price is currently standing at $ 2,225, after an 18% growth over the past two months. Although the altcoin leader was mostly in the green, its performance has been rather lacklustre compared to other major cryptocurrencies.
It’s not exactly a surprise to see Bitcoin cruise past everyone, but the expectations were equally high for Ethereum. Since its inception, Ethereum carved a very distinct path in the crypto industry, establishing itself as both a promising digital currency and an innovative blockchain that underpins an ever-expanding ecosystem of decentralized applications (dApps). Its unique features and cutting-edge technological advantages have been the source of its appeal and resilience for so many years. Despite these attributes, Ethereum wasn’t among the big winners in 2023.
However, the scenario could change in 2024, as Ethereum prepares for further upgrades that could see its price break new records. Vitalik Buterin, Ethereum’s co-founder, has recently shared the improvements that lie ahead for Ethereum in a revised roadmap for 2024 posted on X (former Twitter), so let’s see how this year is going to look for the network.
Pushing forward with new upgrades
Ethereum is no stranger to upgrades and improvements as these developments have helped the network grow and morph into the smart contract and dApp powerhouse it is today. The Merge, which rolled out in September 2022, is by far the most notable of these upgrades, as it enabled the transition from a Proof-of-Work (PoW) consensus mechanism to a Proof-of-Stake (PoS) model and helped reduce the network’s energy consumption by 99%.
In 2024, Ethereum will pick up where it left off, focusing on the next steps in its evolution, namely the Surge, the Scourge, the Verge, the Purge, and the Splurge. Despite the considerable progress it has made over the years, Ethereum still has many issues and shortcomings to address, and that’s exactly what these upgrades are going to target.
Although it was completed successfully, the Merge left many loose ends, with the PoS consensus mechanism needing a few more tweaks to perform at its best. So, the first action that Ethereum is going to focus on in 2024 is the implementation of Single Slot Finality (SSF) which aims to fix the flaws in the PoS system.
Currently, Ethereum’s usability is affected by two main problems: the high transaction fees and the amount of time it takes to confirm and finalize transactions, estimated at about fifteen minutes. The first issue can be adeptly solved through the use of Layer 2 solutions, while SSF can provide an answer for the second problem.
With SSF, Ethereum will be able to improve the block validation process by allowing blocks to be finalized within the same slot. This means that users will no longer have to wait fifteen minutes for Ethereum to confirm transactions and that could be a major game-changer for the network.
The Surge represents another important phase in Ethereum’s developmental roadmap, encompassing goals such as reaching 100,000 transactions per second on rollups. There will be notable advancements in rollup scaling, including on EIP-4844, which will make it easier for Ethereum to handle larger amounts of data and support a wide range of applications and features for its users.
The roadmap also shows that Ethereum’s longstanding centralization issue is to be addressed through the Scourge. The purpose is to address risks related to Maximum Extractable Value (MEV) and liquid pooling, which are necessary for maintaining the decentralized nature of the Ethereum network.
The impact on Ethereum’s price action
All the updates and upgrades outlined in the Ethereum network for 2024 sound great in theory, but their implementation comes with a fair share of challenges. Verifiable Delay Functions (VDFs) are known to pose a concern for developers and other issues could arise along the way, but the Ethereum team is confident they’ll be able to tackle these obstacles successfully and move forward with the improvements as planned.
Another major point of interest is related to the impact that these changes could have on Ethereum’s price performance. While no one can predict what could happen in the future as the Ethereum price suffers the influence of a wide range of factors, analysts predict that it’s possible for Ethereum to experience a major surge in the months to come if everything goes according to plan.
This forecast doesn’t stem from wishful thinking but is based on the liquidity indicator which can offer valuable insights and point towards potential price movements of tokens. In Ethereum’s case, the tool indicated that a bullish trend is likely to appear on the horizon in 2024, and that could help the coin recover much of its lost value over the course of the following months.
Wrapping up
Ethereum’s ambitious roadmap for 2024 highlights the network’s commitment to continuous improvement and innovation. The platform has always been a trailblazer in the blockchain arena, and with the upcoming upgrades which are expected to enhance its scalability, efficiency, and functionality, the network is bound to become even stronger and raise the bar higher in the crypto industry. Hopefully, this will also translate into a substantial price increase for Ethereum and help the crypto break above its previous record.
